


and every muscle in your body sings as the road ignites

by janie_tangerine



Category: Iron Fist (TV), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Driving, F/M, Gen, I Don't Even Know, Post-Episode: s01e08 The Defenders, Singing, Superhero Babysitter Claire Temple, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Tumblr Prompt, ironfistweek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-26
Updated: 2018-10-26
Packaged: 2019-08-08 02:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16420541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janie_tangerine/pseuds/janie_tangerine
Summary: in which Danny is on a quest to get a proper driver's license.





	and every muscle in your body sings as the road ignites

**Author's Note:**

> SO, third ironfistweek fic without a proper theme because I couldn't be arsed to stick to it. This was combining two prompts, _some Colleen/Danny where he goes super paranoid about something and Colleen takes the control of the situation because she's such a badass and we all love her?_ \+ _Here’s a prompt. In the car, Danny has a habit of singing obnoxiously along to whatever song comes on. After awhile, Colleen gives in and starts singing with Danny because he’s so dorky and she can’t help it._ HOPEFULLY IT MAKES SENSE. Also: THIS SHOW IS COMPLETELY NONSENSICAL WHEN IT COMES TO DANNY'S DRIVING because like hell he should have managed to drive if the last time in S1 was WITH HIS FATHER but anyway I tried to fix it. ALSO: Danny's driving instructor is my old driving instructor, *in spite* of whom I got my license at the first try. Ops.
> 
> Also: nothing belongs to me, the title is from Springsteen even if slightly reworked and I'll go saunter vaguely back downwards now.

“I should get a license,” Danny tells her two days after Midland Circle.

“A _license_? For what?”

“Oh. Right. I mean, I should know how to drive, like, _properly_ ,” he explains.

Right. _Fair_. Of course he doesn’t have one. She doubts people took driving lessons in K’Un-Lun, and he certainly hasn’t had time for it since he came back.

“Well,” she says, “you don’t _need_ it, I mean, we’re in New York, and I guess you could use a company car —”

“I know, I know,” he says, “but — I mean, it could be useful, and I might need it one day, and fine, I _did_ drive until this point but you know, it’s not — what if I get pulled over or something? And there’s a lot of shit I don’t know and my father didn’t really teach me the _theory_ , you know. And like, what if one day I get pulled over and they find out that I’m driving _without_ one?”

“You could pay the fine,” she jokes, and he laughs back at her, but — he has a point. Never mind the whole _Immortal Iron Fist_ part of the deal, if someone busted him on _that_ it wouldn’t be… well, it’d be humiliating, she figures.

“I _could_ , but — I don’t want to do this breaking the law, you know. Even if I don’t even _need_ a car, but that’s beside the point.”

“Hey, it’s not like you _can’t_ get it. It should be fairly easy — I don’t know, though, I never got one. But it’s not like you _need_ it, living here.”

“Right,” he says. “I’ll just — go online and check then.”

She tells him all the info should be on the state’s website for the Department of Motor Vehicles, and ten minutes later he’s printing out information and neatly putting it in a folder. She can hear him telling himself that it sounds like a piece of cake.

She glances at it, then she says she’ll go out for a walk while he worries about dinner and heads for a nearby bookstore. When she comes back up, she drops the New York State _Driver’s Manual_ on the table.

“What — you didn’t have to,” he says, sounding _touched_.

“I know,” she replies, “but you seem serious about it, so why _wouldn’t_ I?”

“What would I even do without you?” He grins, and they don’t worry about any license teste until the very next morning.

Also, they eat the dinner cold, but it was entirely worth it.

——

Danny takes it _extremely_ seriously. He buys another book, does all the tests that came with the books in question, then buys a _third_ one, thicker than both, and doesn’t try the theory test until he has all of the tests on those books right for at least four-fifths of the questions. When he goes for the theory test, he looks fairly sure about it.

“Hey,” he tells her the morning before he goes to take it, “I punched a dragon _and_ I actually know how to drive, twenty questions with six allowed mistakes won’t be what ends me.”

“Break a leg,” she tells him before she kisses him _and_ then pushes him out the door before he’s late.

He passes the test with _one_ mistake, and the question was apparently tricky, and he looks like it’s his birthday and Christmas rolled together when he gets his learner’s permit in the mail.

“Shit,” he says after apparently doing some math, “too bad no one can testify that I probably _did_ drive some hours after dark.”

“Danny, I don’t know if the circumstances would make them consider _those_ hours acceptable.”

“… Fair,” he admits. “Well, I guess I’ll just find a driving school nearby and do them there, how hard can it be?”

“Hey, you’re halfway and you don’t have to _learn_ , you _will_ manage.”

“Let’s hope,” he says, but he looks _really_ happy about this, and hey, well, she gets it. He’s doing a thing that people usually have done at sixteen unless they really don’t need it, and he _does_ like driving even if it could be improved — but then again, whatever he learned at _thirteen_ at most certainly could be improved. Why wouldn’t he be excited about it?

“Well, if you want the full experience you should get a crappy used car the moment you get the definitive license.”

He laughs, looking horrified at the prospect. “Yeah, and where do I park it? In our nonexistent garage?”

“Fair, I don’t want any in _my_ dojo, thank you very much.”

Still, she _might_ put a small party together when he gets it. Just in case. Most people she knew who bothered to get one got it, so — he should, if anything for most of the full-on experience. After all, it’s not like getting that license is going to be a problem, will it?

——

He signs up for lessons at a nearby driving school. He’s actually excited for it when she leaves in the morning and says she’ll see him later — he has the first lesson at four-something PM and she’ll be back home at six, she’ll ask him how it went then. And she has no doubt that it’ll go well — he _can_ drive, in theory, so what could even go badly?

——

She comes back home.

She expects him to be in front of the computer catching up on _something_ — hopefully he’s not going out to catch criminals later tonight.

Instead everything is completely silent and no one’s there, _what the hell_.

“Danny?” She calls out. No reply. What the fuck —

Then the door opens, and Danny comes in and looks… bad. But not just _regular_ bad, like —

“Fuck,” he’s muttering, his fists shoved into his pockets. He hasn’t noticed she’s back, most likely. “ _Fuck_.”

“Hey,” she says, turning on the light, “did it go wrong?”

He looks up at her with the face of someone who’s about to have a complete meltdown in the span of five minutes, and _what the fuck_ , it was a test drive…?

“You could say it,” he says, and wait, _why_ is he sounding like he’s going to hyperventilate at any moment? “I mean, it was bad enough that everyone else was, like, _sixteen_ or something and all of them were asking why I was getting the license so late and so on, and good thing they didn’t recognize me, but — uh, the instructor did.”

“… Okay. And?”

“ _And_ , we got in the car and he told me to just go for it since _I looked that sure of myself_.”

“… What the fuck?”

“I know…? I mean, I don’t know, but anyway, I started it and he we went around for a bit but he started going over every single thing I was doing wrong, then asked who taught me and I told him my father had but he died when I was _ten_ , then he went into a rant about irresponsible rich people teaching their _children_ things they have no business knowing, but like, what could I have done about it, tell him no?”

“Danny —”

“So, he keeps on listing every single thing I’m not doing right and at some point I ask him what I can do to get better and he says that since _I was so sure I knew what I was doing_ why did I need him anyway, and that was because when he asked me with how much I passed the test I said nineteen and I didn’t, like, you know, do it wanting to sound like I was a genius or something, but apparently I was _bragging_? And what I was doing taking a driver’s license at my age when I could pay the fine anyway? And so on, and then at some point he said I didn’t have good reflexes and asked me if I’d consider getting _something_ for it —”

“Danny, did he tell you do _take meds for driving_?”

“Kind of? I guess? I don’t know but then at some point he said I wasn’t going fast enough, then I was too slow, then I forgot to turn on the lights or something and asked me if I thought I could get away with forgetting the basics just because I have money and just — by the time we were done I was, you know, not really feeling great and he probably noticed because then he said that if I couldn’t get some thick skin then good luck driving in New York, and now I feel like shit and I kind of want to throw up and _I don’t know what I did wrong_ —”

“Danny, _calm down_ ,” she interrupts him, putting her hands on his shoulders and squeezing hard enough that he stops hyperventilating, _good_. “Okay. Take a couple breaths. Slow.”

He does, nodding a few times, then goes with her when she pushes him down on the sofa.

“Good. Now, listen to me a moment — this guy is an _ass,_ all right?”

“I mean, maybe he was right about —”

“Your father? Okay, fine, but he didn’t need to be a fucking asshole about it. It’s not your fault and your _father_ chose to teach you _then_ , it’s not on you. And like, is it even his business? And who tells anyone to get _meds_ for driving?”

“I just, I really wanted to do this right, but —”

“ _Danny_. First, you did it _right_ and anyone thinking you were bragging because you passed that test with _one_ mistake is a damned idiot. Now, let’s see if we can get to the bottom of this. How many hours of driving do you need before you take the test?”

“Fifty,” he says. “At least, with like, ten in heavy traffic and fifteen at night.”

“Do they need to be with an instructor?”

“No,” he says, “but it’s gotta be someone with a license. I mean, I could cheat, but I don’t _want_ to cheat. And — I mean, I could find another school but this one is just nearby and I’m _not_ enrolling in some college class for it because that’d be even worse, given how the sixteen year-olds reacted. If anyone recognizes me —”

“No,” she agrees, “bad idea. Hm, well, I _don’t_ have one, so I can’t help you there.” She never needed it — she lives in New York, she can get anywhere without. “But, I think we can fix this.”

“… How?”

“Give me your phone,” she grins, and Danny does it at once.

Well, she thinks, scrolling through his number list. _Time to make a couple of calls_.

——

“Stop!” Claire Temple says at once as Danny _almost_ crashes into the car behind him, and Ward decides that he’s really, _really_ glad that it’s the two of them in this.

“Fuck,” Danny says, “ _fuck.”_

“Wow,” Ward quips, “I hadn’t heard you swearing this much, like, _ever_. It’s true that driving brings the worst out of everyone.”

Danny groans out loud but doesn’t correct him. “This is stupid. This is fucking stupid. I don’t — it shouldn’t be —”

“Danny,” Claire interrupts him, “it’s parallel parking and it’s the first time you actually try it, calm down.”

“Yeah, well,” Danny says, “if you were about to say _you punched a dragon in the heart so you can do this_ , don’t. Because I swear to fucking _whatever_ you want, punching a dragon in the heart was way less hard than _parallel parking_.”

Claire does _not_ look impressed with that. Ward isn’t either, admittedly, but laughing at the absurdity of this situation would be mean as hell _and_ he’s sure Colleen would cut his fucking head if he did that.

Also, _he_ agreed to do this, so maybe it’s not a good idea.

“You wanna know my opinion?”

“Share,” Claire says, “I want to know if it’s the same as mine.”

“I think,” Ward goes on, “that you’re overthinking it.”

“I’m _overthinking_ it.”

Ward reaches out and moves Danny’s hand away from the steering wheel. It’s covered in sweat. “You’re taking this as a matter of life or death and while I can appreciate it since last time we had a drive together you weren’t being _that_ great at it, you’re not a menace and you’re never going to learn if that’s your attitude.”

“I agree with him,” Claire says at once. Ward thinks he likes having an ally.

“So,” he goes on, “while your previous instructor honestly sounds like the kind of goals anyone would have if they want to make sure no one comes to their funeral, just forget him for a fucking moment. Claire, stay where you are and check that nothing happens. Drive out of here and let’s do this again.”

“Okay,” Danny says, sounding _really_ not chipper about this. Which is weird. He’s _always_ fucking chipper. Fuck it all, Ward _misses_ him sounding chipper.

This is — never mind. Danny drives out of the parking spot and double-parks a few cars ahead.

“Good. Now, try it again, go _slow_ , start turning the wheel when the back of the car reaches the passenger door of the one on the side, _then_ you get in when you’re close to the sidewalk and turn all the other way around. Claire’s going to stop you if she sees that you’re getting too close and that spot is large enough, so we’re not moving until you manage.”

“Fine,” Danny sighs, “let’s do it.” He wipes his hands on his jeans, then starts the car again —

And starts turning too soon.

“Stop!” Claire says. “Those tires wouldn’t appreciate.”

Right, the ones belonging to the car in front of them.

“ _Shit_ ,” Danny sighs, his forehead hitting the wheel. Claire moves to the other side, putting a hand on his shoulder through the windowsill.

“It’s nothing terrible,” she says, “you’ll have the hang of it before we’re done here. And hey, we’ve been doing this in the dark for one hour, it does count for your record.”

“Right,” he says, “but — shit. I just, I keep being sure I’ll crash into some pole if not into the car behind,” Danny says, sounding miserable.

Ward thinks they need to change the approach here.

“You know what,” he says, “you’re really overthinking this. Wait.” He reaches out, turns on the radio and finds some classical music station — that shit’s supposed to be _calm_ , right?

The piece they get _doesn’t_ sound too relaxing, admittedly, it’s some kind of crescendo and someone’s _singing_ in Italian and Ward has no idea what’s it about, but it’s still music without singing or electric guitars, it should work. “Don’t think about everything that could go wrong,” he says, “just — try to relax, okay? That’s not gonna work otherwise.”

Danny nods and drives out of the spot, again. He breathes in, glances back, starts driving backward —

And starts turning _right_ where he should have.

“Good,” Ward says, “now you turn the wheel _all_ the way in while you go in slow, okay?”

“Okay,” Danny says, his fingers drumming against the wheel along with whatever opera is still playing on the radio. Huh. He pushes the pedal, slow, the back of the car going all the way in.

“You can turn!” Claire warns from the outside. Danny does, still going way too slow.

“Turn that wheel _all_ the way,” Ward tells him, and Danny does, and —

“Holy shit,” he says as he sees that he actually did it in _two_ takes. “Holy _shit_.”

“See,” Ward says, “I told you it wasn’t hard, and if you want to say thanks you can but _turn off the engine first_ , maybe?”

“Oh, right, I’m sorry, _right_ ,” Danny says, shutting the car off, and then he _hugs_ him, fuck, never mind that the gear shift is in between them and it must be uncomfortable.

“I can’t believe — you’re a _genius_ ,” Danny goes on.

“I turned on the fucking radio,” Ward protests, “that’s not —”

“I always thought it would be distracting but it’s _not_. Wow. I should’ve done it from the start. Hey, you think maybe we could do more of that driving in the dark now?” Well, at least he sounds _excited_ now, Ward figures.

“Sure,” Claire says, moving inside the car and _clapping Ward on his shoulder_ , what the hell. “We had another hour after all. Meachum, I think you’re wasted running a company, you’d be a good instructor.”

“Hell, _no_ ,” Ward says, shuddering. “I don’t need a bunch of sixteen year-olds crashing into my life at once.”

“Hey, she’s right. You’re better at it than the guy from the driving school,” Danny says as he drives out of the parking lot. Good thing he’s going _slow_.

“Yeah, and turn on the lights.”

“ _Right_ , sorry. But see, you aren’t making me feel like an idiot for forgetting it.”

“You’d be an idiot if you forgot it at the thirtieth hour of _supervised driving_ , not the third,” Ward says. “Claire, I need to write a text, can you make sure he doesn’t crash?”

“You’ve got it,” she says from the backseat.

Good. He takes his phone, texts Colleen — _he figured out parallel parking, no thanks to that asshole_.

_Thank you_ , she texts a moment later.

Christ. They’re being actually _civil_.

Ward figures that he’s not going to complain about the turn of events, tries and fails to not laugh when Danny shouts _fuck you_ to some guy cutting in front of him without using the turn signal, and decides that maybe there are worse ways than teaching Danny how to not crash the damned car he can spend fifty hours of his life doing.

That said, he’s going to be owed _at least_ a full dinner after Danny gets the damned license.

——

Colleen’s in the middle of trying to figure out her grocery shopping when her phone rings a month or so later — _right_ , Danny had the test today. She takes it, hoping it went well.

“Hey,” she asks, “how did it go?”

“I passed it,” he says, and she can _hear_ he’s grinning. “Imagine what, the examiner said I was a _natural_. I didn’t have the heart to correct him, but —”

“Have you filmed it and sent it to your former instructor?”

“I should have,” Danny says wistfully, “but hey, you think that I can drive you somewhere to eat tonight? I mean, to celebrate.”

“Sure,” she replies, “you can pick the place.”

“I’ll be at yours at seven,” he says, and then the call is over and Colleen decides she can buy food tomorrow. She goes back home after getting just the bare necessities, changes into clean clothes and gets out of the house at seven. Indeed, a car pulls up to their door and it’s the green Ford that Danny’s bought second-hand because even before taking lessons he had gathered that the Aston Martin was _not_ the kind of car you wanted to practice anything on.

He’s also going within speed limit, which is probably a good thing since he only has a temporary permit until the regular one arrives in the mail.

She gets in the passenger seat and finds him beaming behind the wheel — he shuts down the car before dragging her in for a kiss and it lasts until someone behind them starts honking.

“Ouch,” he says, “sorry!” He immediately turns the engine on and drives forward, turning on the left.

“Right,” he says, “should be twenty minutes from here.”

“No one’s in a hurry.”

“Well, I don’t want to get pulled over,” he says. Then he turns on the radio.

At a fairly high volume.

“Since when you’re into Queen?” She asks as she recognizes _I Want To Break Free_ playing over the speakers.

“Oh,” he says, “Claire is. I mean, we found out that I drive better with music on and she said they were her favorite to drive to, so I tried them and she was right. I mean, they’re _great_.”

Okay, it makes sense that Claire likes Queen. Fair enough. They never were Colleen’s _specific_ thing, but they’re fine enough, she figures. Danny turns up the volume as he drives forward, humming under his breath. Then he moves towards a fairly trafficked crossing area —

“ _I’ve fallen in love, I’ve fallen in love for the first and this time I know it’s for real_ —” He starts, _loud_ , and then he stops himself. “Uh, do you mind?”

“… No?” She asks. “I mean, you’re kinda off key, but who even cares?”

“It’s just,” he says, “it’s relaxing.”

“Danny, you don’t have to justify yourself to me or anything, you can maul Freddie Mercury to your liking.”

“Fair,” he says, “I’ll make it up to you later.”

“Look at the road instead, will you?”

“Oh. Right. _Sure_ ,” he says as the light turns green and he drives forward. He stays silent for a moment, then —

“ _It’s strange but it’s true, I can’t get over the way you love me like you do, but I have to be sure, when I walk out the door, oh, how I want to be free, baby_ …” He goes on, _absolutely_ off-key, but he’s also driving ahead looking absolutely sure of it and it’s fairly adorable that he knows the entire thing by heart because most likely Claire put it on in the previous month. He speeds up, turns right —

“ _But life still goes on, I can’t get used to living without, living without, living without you, by my side, I don’t want to live alone… God knows, got to make it on my own_ …” Shit, now that he said _I don’t want to live alone_ he sounded slightly less chipper and _wait_ is she overthinking it or is _he_ overthinking it, she doesn’t know, but then he sings louder at the last stanza and fuck, that song is catchy and it’s true that he’s not getting distracted —

“Hey,” he asks when it’s over, “you mind if I put it on again?”

“No,” she says, “particular reason?”

“Nah, but it’s catchy.”

“Go ahead.”

He puts it back on.

“ _I want to break free,_ ” he starts, “ _I want to break free, I want to break free from your lies, you’re so self-satisfied I don’t need you, I’ve got to break free_ —”

Thing is: it’s catchy, and even if he’s totally off-key it’s just so _him_ that she wants to grin same as he is, and she _does_ know that damned song, everyone does —

Fuck it.

“ _God knows, God knows I want to break free_ ,” she sings along with him, and for a split moment he looks at her as the corner of his mouth quirks upwards —

“I’ve fallen in love,” he sings even more obnoxiously after then.

“I’ve fallen in love for the first time,” she sings back, and fine, she’s better than him at this but it barely even matters —

“And this time I know it’s for real,” he echoes, and then she sees that the road is empty and —

Ah, fuck it.

“I’ve fallen in love,” she sings along, her hand covering his on the shift.

He looks at the road, but his fingers threat with hers as he drives forward, and she opens her mouth just as _he_ does for the last bit —

_God knows, God knows I’ve fallen in love_ , they sing at the same time, and it feels _good_ and he’s actually driving really damned well, and she thinks she’s not going to move her hand until he needs to park or _something_.

Before they arrive at the restaurant, they’ve gone through _The Show Must Go On_ as well, and as he parks, he’s smiling _not_ so slightly.

“You know,” he says, “the next one is _Bohemian Rhapsody_.”

“Do you mean we’re mauling the operatic section while we drive back?”

“I’m down with it if you are.”

“You know what, dignity’s overrated. I’m looking forward to it.”

“Me, too,” he says, and maybe they kiss for some five minutes while out of the car before getting into the restaurant, and she decides that if this is how this driving business starts, she’s going to ask him for a ride as often as possible.

She’s fairly sure he wouldn’t mind, anyway.

 

 

End.

**Author's Note:**

> friendly reminder that [Iron Fist week](https://ironfistweek.tumblr.com/) is live on tumblr! ;)


End file.
